Steel Horizon

Chapter Fifteen

I stayed alive by staying away from everyone.

Most people stayed in groups to try to survive, to wait it out and fight them together when they came. I did the opposite. I stayed away from people, and in the same way, stayed away from the Scrappers. I also didn't trust people with my own life. I couldn't sleep while someone else was keeping watch. I was constantly worried Scrappers would be attracted to a group of people, and when they came I would be with them. It was an undeniable fear of mine.

I could trust myself.

It was the one thing I could count on.

I kept thinking that as I ran behind Jude. I still had the urge to take myself out of the equation, to disappear before it was too late. My heart told me to stay with my cousin and Jude, but my mind told me to leave if I wanted to survive.

Our feet slid in the snow as we ran back up the hill towards the Jeep, and hopefully towards Kaileb and Elliot. We only heard the one gun shot, and nothing more to give us evidence of what was happening. The Jeep came into sight, silent and still, surrounded by the buildings reflecting the same. We came to a stop.

"Do you see them anywhere?" I asked.

"No . . . wait." He turned around, towards the direction they had gone earlier. "Do you hear that?"

I listened harder. "Voices. It sounds like them."

Jude nodded and we both started down the street, aware of everything around us and waiting for something to move. We went for a block before we finally caught sight of them. It was a department store on the corner of another intersection and the front window had been shattered. Glass lay across the sidewalk and into the street, but something else was among the sharp pieces. It was a body—crumpled and limp, laying twisted like a dummy that had been thrown from a crash test car. Even from where I stood, I could tell its spine had been broken. Kaileb and Elliot stood nearby, staring down at it like they couldn't believe what had happened.

We stopped on the other side of the body and looked down at the dead Scrapper with wary eyes. His eyes were open, one black, and the other steel, reflecting the soft sunlight coming through the clouds above us. I could never get used to being close to them.

"You shot it?" Jude asked, glancing up at Kaileb who still had his pistol in hand. He appeared to be slightly in shock.

"Yeah . . ." He trailed off but didn't elaborate.

Elliot pointed a thumb towards the department store. "We were in there trying to find Kaileb a new pair of boots, you know? We don't like to pass up an opportunity like that, so we went in and looked around. And then—"

Jude nodded. "And then?"

Elliot looked up briefly, like he had forgotten we were there. "He must have come from the back room while our backs were turned. Suddenly he was just there." His voice shook on the last word. "He already had his weapon out, you know, one of those the pistol ones? I didn't even have time to react. But before the thing could shoot me, Kaileb shot him."

"It didn't kill him, though," Kaileb muttered. He shoved his gun into his bag and swung it back around his shoulders. "He landed on a piece of glass . . . and was it."

I couldn't stand being near that thing one second longer.

As I moved past them and the body, I heard Jude ask, "Are you guys alright though?"

"Yeah, I think so," Kaileb answered. "Morgan, where are you going?"

I paused in the doorway. "Just taking a look around."